Who Lost the Election of Hillary Rodham Clinton?

The finger-pointing has begun among top aides to losing presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. They blame FBI Director James Comey and the media, of all things, for the Democrat’s devastating loss in the presidential election.

The irony couldn’t be more off the true reason. Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, communications director Jennifer Palmieri and other Clinton aides sought to provide explanations during a private conference call Thursday with supporters of the Democratic nominee for a loss that many thought came out of nowhere.

The first part of this irony is Podesta himself. Part of Hillary’s downfall with voters was the WikiLeaks flow of Podesta emails that presented a conniving, ruthless man who would stop at nothing to gain victory for his client. Day after day the emails were uncovered and, if not boldly, were printed by a reluctant second base of support for Hillary; the biased, in the tank, mainstream media.

Hillary’s team had many excuses, none of which were truly the ultimate voter rejection of the former Secretary of State. The primary villain in their perceived excuse for the shocking loss was Director Comey. He had been the darling of the Hillary campaign when he basically exonerated an obviously guilty Clinton by his own words to a selected House committee.

Democrat finger pointing.

But Comey flattened the Clinton team when he announced new evidence that had become known concerning her top aide Huma Abedin and her disgraced husband, former congressman Anthony Wiener, the sexting pervert. Podesta said Comey is the guy “who we think may have cost us the election,” according to one Clinton surrogate who relayed details about the call to The Hill.

It’s total karma how far the mighty have fallen in a panicked Hillary campaign staff. Instead of ignoring the headline evidence, they made it worse by trying to explain it away. A nation that was exhausted from Clinton scandals dating back to Hillary’s purchase of cattle futures in the 1980’s that netted her $100,000 in a short period; it was the final straw for the voting electorate. Their response in November was a loud and clear, no more Clinton dynasty and all the corruption and lying that goes with it.

One Hillary aide was quoted as saying, “We saw turnout down and didn’t do nearly as well as we thought. Something happened and it happened in a pretty steady way late in the race. What it amounted to was most definitely Clinton fatigue and no Barack Obama on the ballot to rally the far-left progressives.”

Many had already seen enough with Hillary’s operatives’ treatment of their underdog candidate, socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders. That treatment came back to bite Hillary in states like Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Michigan. She lost every one of those states that had been mostly predicted to be blue.

Nevertheless, polls between Clinton and Republican Donald Trump had already tightened when the Comey bombshell broke, and the race appeared to get closer over the next week. Hillary began returning to blue states thought solid by her voter profile. By the time Comey said the FBI had not found any information in the 650,000 new emails examined for only eight days, it was far too late and her fate had been sealed.

Then there was the media excuse that had irony written all over it if anyone paid attention to the far-left, Hillary-backing, biased to the core, mainstream media. To even suggest her personal cheering section was to blame is incredible.

Hillary critics claimed that the media covered Trump. He sold newspapers and sent ratings soaring for the networks and cable stations. “He was someone who was entertaining and sort of gave him a pass.” Podesta said. How he could say what he did with a straight face should provide him an Academy Award nomination.

Podesta wasn’t through. He said that the press created a “false moral equivalency” in its coverage of Clinton and Trump.

Podesta also blamed the press for “the dominance of the way they covered the email” controversy, saying it overlooked “the conflicts of Trump’s businesses, the Russian contacts we are now learning to be true, and the failure of the press following the 3-page leak to the New York Times to really dig into the income tax question.” He had every excuse in the book except Hillary Clinton and her tired message of staying the course.

No less than Hillary’s number one media ally, The New York Times, printed an explosive article in October that suggested Trump may not have paid income taxes for more than a decade. Trump was criticized for possible business dealings in Russia. Was that “biased coverage” of Trump by one of Hillary’s closest co-conspirators in the media?

But Podesta and the other finger-pointers aside, Hillary Rodham Clinton did not understand the growing anger in this country. The past eight years have brought the kind of government that many people feel abandoned by. Clinton’s speech earlier in the campaign, painting half of Trump’s base as “deplorable,” was the final nail in her coffin.

Her description of the people she loathes ruminated through the Rust Belt States that have suffered the most under Obama’s administration. Her ignorance of the real problem with the anti-establishment sentiment sweeping the country was never more evident than in those very states.

As Election night progressed past the obvious blue states of New York; actually New York City, Connecticut, Vermont, et al, those who sensed the anger waited for the central time zone election results. After Trump squeaked by in Florida and North Carolina to put the Clinton campaign on edge, the worst was yet to come.

In succession, she heard loud and clear from the deplorable masses of white, working class Americans. It was a living nightmare for those congregated at the Javitts Center with their party hats and confetti ready to whoop it up into the night. Like dominoes, it went Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and the final death blow; Michigan.

Did she fail to campaign harder in these states considered in the bag and loyal blue? No, it was an uprising of angry Americans who, like Howard Beale in the film “Network,” opened the window and screamed out, “I am mad as hell and I am not going to take it anymore.”

Dwight L. Schwab Jr. is a moderate conservative who looks at all sides of a story, then speaks his mind. He has written more than 3500 national political and foreign affairs columns. His BS in journalism from the University of Oregon, with minors in political science and American history stands him in good stead for his writing.

Publishing

Dwight has 30-years in the publishing industry, including ABC/Cap Cities and International Thomson. His first book, “Redistribution of Common Sense – Selective Commentaries on the Obama Administration 2009-2014,” was published in July, 2014. “The Game Changer – America’s Most Stunning Presidential Election in History,” was published in April 2017.

Location

Dwight is a native of Portland, Oregon, and now a resident of the San Francisco Bay Area.